Winners & Losers: Charm City, MLL and Late-Blooming Recruits

Major League Lacrosse's second half kicked off with the Outlaws being dominant as they have been all year, the Machine's struggles continuing, forcing a coaching change in Ohio, a thrilling win for Charlotte and much more.

The LXM Pro Tour's second stop hit San Diego, with Team STX taking home another win. Also, @ILPreps is again all over as the recruiting season is in full force.

Another busy summer weekend. Here are the winners and losers:

Winners

Geoff Shannon (@Geoff_Shannon)

Baltimore's Economy — Charm City should see its annual economic lacrosse influx in the next six weeks, as the sport's top recruits, club teams and coaches descend on the area. Coaches have been decamped in the region since this past weekend, which featured King of the Hill, Baltimore Summer Kickoff and the start of Nike Blue Chip camp. Nike Blue Chip continues this week at UMBC, along with Top 205 at Towson, and eventually the Under Armour All-American weekend in early July. Tack on some Baltimore Crab team events, and Under Armour Shootout sessions and that's a lot mess of kids and parents spending cash on local businesses. Now, are there other places we'd rather like to spend our summers than humid Baltimore? Sure. But the region enjoys the lax-based economy.

Matt Kinnear (@MattKinnear)

Boston Cannons — Maybe it speaks to how important coaching has become in this league. Since John Tucker has taken the reins, the Cannons have looked like a much better team. Just a few weeks ago, they looked disjointed and too reliant on Paul Rabil. Now, they’ve won two straight and overall looked like a team with a gameplan. Players like Will Manny have found their place on the roster. They’ll be a team that is in the thick of the playoff hunt.

John Jiloty (@jjiloty)

Charlotte Hounds — The second-year franchise picked up a huge win on Saturday by beating defending champ Chesapeake in OT. It would have been easy to predict the veteran-laden Bayhawks would have prevailed over the young Hounds after Charlotte cut Chesapeake’s once 12-7 lead to 13-12 heading into the fourth quarter. But the Hounds got five fourth-quarter saves from Adam Ghitelman and outstanding offensive outings from Matt Danowski and Ryan Young to get the win and stand 4-4 on the season.

Zach Babo (@ZachBabo)

Lacrosse on TV — This is kind of general, but last week I took some time off to handle some family obligations and see some old friends in New York and New Jersey. While generally it’s encouraging every time I get into a talk with someone about what I do and we descend into a further discussion of lacrosse, it was even more enjoyable that those conversations often could go a level deeper than the standard vague familiarity with the game as people become more and more exposed to it. Leading the increased awareness of the game certainly seems to be its growing TV presence, as many nonlacrosse enthusiast told me how they watched a lot more lacrosse on TV this year, seeing it on more frequently and being more inclined to stop and linger, often coming to the conclusion that for whatever they might not know about the sport, they really enjoy watching it.

For someone who cultivated an interest in hockey in a similar fashion (I never played it nor did I grow up around it, but I have come to love going to games and watching hockey on TV), I find this yet another strong sign of the game’s growth in terms of cultural presence.

Casey Vock (@cvock)

Summer lacrosse gear and unis — While there’s not nearly as many eyes on it during the summer, it’s enjoyable to see the lighter-hearted side of the sport as the summer months bring us a ridiculous amount of wild and wacky uniforms. It’s already started over on ILGear.com. Check it out, and be sure to send your custom club summer gear our way for posting.

Losers

Geoff Shannon (@Geoff_Shannon)

The Showoff Recruit — You know who you are. You don't pass. You take too many shots. You try to dodge through six players to show the coaches how athletic you are. You get the groundball with the longpole and then run it up field and take a reckless shot. You showboat on day one and dog it on day three. You don't think coaches notice this, but be aware, they do. There's a plus/minus ratio to be kept on recruits like you, and goals don't make up for the bad turnovers and selfish play. Play athletically, play wisely, play unselfishly.

Matt Kinnear (@MattKinnear)

The Machine Offense — Quint appropriately dubbed them the Ohio “Turn-Over Machine” in his column this week. The team put on an embarassing performance against the Outlaws on Saturday. In the first half, Ohio had four shots on goal; scoring only five goals in an MLL game is just crazy. There’s not an identity on offense, and I think Steele Stanwick — a generational talent — is underutilized. Coach Ted Garber got the axe this week; let’s hope Bear Davis’ first move is to forge some sort of identity on offense.

John Jiloty (@jjiloty)

College recruiters who don’t leave spots for late-bloomers — It’s clear that there’s more high school lacrosse talent out there than ever before. So while the blue chips are still pretty much coming from the traditional Northeast spots, there is more talent throughout the country. More and more kids are falling through the cracks as the DI powers lock up their classes with sophomores. But some amazingly talented players are breaking out late and turning into dynamic college players, as evidenced by the DI parity we saw this year more than ever.

Zach Babo (@ZachBabo)

New York Lizards — I was thinking the win against Hamilton in Week 7 may have been a turning point for a talented team that is still struggling to come together, but the Lizards followed up the W with a loss to Boston, and again it seems they are underachieving. Worse, a win over the Cannons would have had the double-down effect of improving the Lizards’ spot in the standings while potentially burying a rival’s playoff hopes. Now everyone is drifting more towards mediocre, with very little definition about who might be best amongst this middle group in the league.

Casey Vock (@cvock)

Weekends off — I took a weekend away from lacrosse for the first time in I don’t know how many weekends, and all it did was make me feel like I’d missed something. Instead of feeling refreshed, I’m rattled with thoughts of what I might have not seen but should have. Go figure.